That is a quote directly from Geoff Goodman. Please bear that in mind for the rest of this post.
There are 2 hero attributes that are key in Overwatch. Level of Self-Sustain, and Mobility. Almost every hero has at least one form of one of them, and the more a hero has, the better they generally are. For the purposes of this analysis:
Self-Sustain = Anything that increases your own health pool, whether that is additional armor, regenerating shields, passive self-heals, or ability self-heals. Base armour is not counted in this definition.
Mobility = Anything that increases the base speed of a hero, whether it’s a standard speed increase, a one off ability, or a teleport.
Below, there are four lists. List one is every hero that has multiple types of self-sustain OR mobility, whether they are one or more of each, or multiple of one, in no particular order. List two is every hero with just the one form of mobility, with details on that ability. List three is the same as list two, but with self-sustain instead. List four is any hero that neither has mobility nor self-sustain.
For clarification, ultimates are not counted, and any ability with multiple charges has each charge counted separately.
List 1 - Heroes with multiple forms of mobility/self-sustain
- Doomfist
- Genji
- Hanzo
- Junkrat
- Pharah
- Reaper
- Soldier:76
- Sombra
- Symmetra
- Tracer
- Wrecking Ball
- Brigitte
- Lucio
- Mercy
- Moira
List 2 - Heroes with 1 form of mobility, with details
- McCree = Combat Roll, 6m range, 8 second cooldown, Horizontal only
- Widowmaker = Grappling Hook, 20m range, 8 second cooldown (10 second on PTR, 360 degree use
- D.Va = Boosters, 25m range, 5 second cooldown, 360 degree use
- Reinhardt = Charge, 55m range, 10 second cooldown, 350HP damage, Horizontal only
- Winston = Jump Pack, 22m range, 6 second cooldown, Arcing ability
List 3 - Heroes with 1 form of self-sustain, with details
- Bastion = Self-Repair, 75HPS, 300HP total, 7 seconds to recharge
- Mei = Cryo-Freeze, 37.5HPS, 150HP total, damage immunity, 12 second cooldown
- Torbjorn = Armor Pack, 75HP burst, costs 50 scrap
- Roadhog = Take A Breather, 300HP burst, 50% damage reduction, 8 second cooldown
- Zarya = Base shields, 30HPS, requires 3 seconds out of combat
- Ana = Biotic Grenade, 100HP burst, 10 second cooldown
- Zenyatta = Base shields, 30HPS, requires 3 seconds out of combat
List 4 - Heroes with no mobility OR self-sustain
- Orisa
When put this way, there are clearly some heroes who’s weaknesses are too severe. Obviously Orisa is on that list as the ONLY hero without any mobility or self-sustain, but other than that:
- Ana is noticeably weak. The only other support who falls under List 2 or 3 is Zenyatta, but where his self-sustain is a passive, Ana has to wait for 10 seconds. Additionally, her self-sustain can only heal half her healthpool, where Zen can heal 3/4 of his, and all other supports can fully heal up.
- Bastion takes damage quicker than he can heal up. The 75HPS would be good on a hero that even moves around at base mobility, but a large part of Bastion’s gameplay is stationary, making it nowhere near enough. This isn’t a problem of his self-sustain as much as it’s a problem with his very character design.
- Torb is in a similar situation to Bastion. The 75HP burst of Armour is great. The issue is that because of a combination of his large critbox, and the scrap gain, it’s very much a product of the steamrolling mechanic Torb has. If you start well, you can make the entire team very hard to kill, but if you start poorly it will be near impossible to turn around. No amount of armour will save you.
- And lastly McCree. 6m is simply not enough of a range to justify an 8 second cooldown. I’m sure either reducing it to a 6 second cooldown or giving him a 2nd charge would help greatly, but at the moment he’s outclassed by almost every DPS because of his lack of mobility.
That last list, they are in my opinion perfect examples of the situation Geoff was talking about. Situations were a heroes weaknesses are overbearing, and need buffing a little. Yes every hero requires weaknesses, but all of those have other weaknesses as well. The ability each has been given to help them keep up with the rest of the cast simply isn’t enough.